The Real Bigfoot and Genuine Bigfoot Tracks
Part 10: What Scientists Can Do, The Real Bigfoot, and Notes
by Mark A. Hall

What Scientists Can Do

When scientists take up the study of Bigfoot reports, they might first rescue the neglected and misplaced bones already in museum collections. The field studies, so often considered to be science at work in the wild, need to be better prepared for than past efforts. Searching streams for tracks failed. Camping out and waiting for all the native wildlife to come to you has also failed. A lot of research should be done before spending more time on safari.

A carefully prepared dossier on Sasquatch/Bigfoot needs to be created. My advice is to review the records from South America to Alaska. Also dip into the records from China, India, and Nepal to isolate what can be found to indicate the presence of the Neo-Giants. Study the tracks and throw out the hoaxes. Isolate those sightings and records that indicate the real Bigfoot, the creatures in the Neo-Giant group. Plot their appearances. Look for their habits and their relationship to food choices and food sources. Consider their relationships to vegetation, both for food for trees for concealment.

Make the most of the films so far obtained that are not fake. Put all this knowledge into any plans executed in the field in search of more evidence. Some day a dead body could turn up if we are prepared to preserve it, which we now are not. Above all, a change in attitude will help Bigfoot seekers. We should not put more effort into obtaining a “specimen.” We should stop thinking that a dead Bigfoot is essential to progress. We should seek observation of them and contact with them.

The Real Bigfoot

When someone goes back to examine the Greenland find of 1926, they will be astonished. They will be asking themselves if it can be that easy to make such a discovery. All it will take is simply to extract those bones from storage and submit them to decent modern testing. Yes, some people will not want to admit that such a thing was overlooked. There will even be opposition by people who prefer the status quo or have staked a position in denying the importance of Homo gardarensis. But those who give the evidence a fair and modern examination will win the argument eventually. More bones and other evidence will turn up as further support. And knowledge will be advanced.

The same holds true for the pursuit of Patterson’s Bigfoot. While the course will be difficult, knowledge will be advanced. It will happen in spite of hoaxing that has occurred and will occur in the future. This will play out in a process that began almost a century ago when John W. Burns realized that something important was going on around him in British Columbia. In the middle of the twentieth century more people joined in the quest. John Green, Rene Dahinden, Ivan Sanderson, and then many more spent their own time and personal resources to organize, however imperfectly, the emerging history of Bigfoot in North America.

There are other advanced primates at large in North America other than the Neo-Giant. They are just as important and equally interesting for human beings to get to know. We can approach them in a similar fashion to that suggested here for the Bigfoot/Sasquatch. We should all be ready to be surprised by how much has been going on all around us for the past two centuries. These creatures have not gone undetected but rather they have been constantly detected while no one has done much about them.

It is true that the pursuit of Bigfoot/Sasquatch has been hampered by hoaxing. From 1912 to 1953 the field of physical anthropology was hampered by the Piltdown hoax. That did not stop people from looking for genuine fossils. The search for the living products of primate evolution will not stop either. Those remarkable people are expressing mankind’s unquenchable curiosity to understand the world around us, even when the enigmas are clever and trying to avoid our grasp.

About Loren ColemanLoren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013.

I don’t like the line about taking all of the films that “are not fake”. Does this mean rule out the obvious, proven hoaxes? I may be wrong, but are there any videos that are known to be, without a doubt, to be not fake? Who is the judge of which ones are “fake” and which are “real”? Can it be said with any certainty that any given video is not fake when even the PG footage is under continued scrutiny? I think at this point we are far from able to say we are in a position to proclaim that any given video is fake or not.

1. “The field studies, so often considered to be science at work in the wild, need to be better prepared for than past efforts. Searching streams for tracks failed. Camping out and waiting for all the native wildlife to come to you has also failed. A lot of research should be done before spending more time on safari.”

Great idea. Now for the money. I don’t see a money plan in here. I HATE to keep bringing that up.

2. “Above all, a change in attitude will help Bigfoot seekers. We should not put more effort into obtaining a “specimen.” We should stop thinking that a dead Bigfoot is essential to progress. We should seek observation of them and contact with them.”

No freaking shee-wha. Thank you, Mark Hall. This thing about killing stuff and stuffing it in drawers has, well, possibly concealed some evidence. Let’s not conceal any more evidence. You will not learn more about me by dissecting my dead body than you will by talking to me. I think that the same applies to the sasquatch. To all that might try to change my mind: whatever you say I have already thought of, much. Go back to the Kill or No Kill thread and read it carefully this time. Let’s not start THAT one again. This is not sentiment talking. This is true science, moving on to new frontiers in knowledge, talking. Come along. Or be left behind. Sorry, but I didn’t say all this in the “Kill” thread.

3. “All it will take is simply to extract those bones from storage and submit them to decent modern testing. Yes, some people will not want to admit that such a thing was overlooked.”

I’m with things-in-the-woods that we want conclusions to follow research, not precede it. But here we have another “change in attitude” situation. Science needs to get over itself, because it has approximately eighty geetzillion metric tons of mistakes and oversights to get over, if the sasquatch exists. And yes the evidence says that’s very plausible. So start getting over it now. Head starts in science are not only cool, but rare. OK, maybe this isn’t one. But there’s no time like NOW.

4. “These creatures have not gone undetected but rather they have been constantly detected while no one has done much about them.”

And here I thought I was the only one saying that! He ain’t invisible and science ain’t omnipotent. Not with its eyes closed, it ain’t. With this level of official ignorance the woodchuck wouldn’t be confirmed yet.

Best of luck to the searchers. And, um, money. Yeah, that.

If I sound frustrated and repetitive, um, 40 years after first reading about the sas and still being on Square One will do that.

Interesting. I completely agree that old specimens that have been sequestered away need to be looked at again. This has, in the past, proved useful, as (I seem to recall) in the re-evaluation of what is now known as Apatasaurus.

“There are other advanced primates at large in North America other than the Neo-Giant. They are just as important and equally interesting for human beings to get to know. We can approach them in a similar fashion to that suggested here for the Bigfoot/Sasquatch.”

I was once a firm believer in multiple species of North American primates but I now feel this belief may do more harm than good. It’s hard enough to get a serious scientific discussion going on Sasquatch. Adding other types of NA apes only confuses the issue.

A dossier on Bigfoot??? I suppose there already is one at the FBI and Homeland Security. The U.S. Forest Service probably has one or several, as well as the Bureau of Land Management, the Corps of Engineers and the Department of the Interior.

Well, a dossier has been done: both Krantz and Bindernagel did their best to do one in book form. The problem is that everyone has a different opinion of which footprints, sightings, and films are genuine. A dossier on an animal that you can’t study (alive or dead) close up is going to remain speculative: it will not be considered authoritative in the scientific world. For example, the Krantz and Bindernagel dossiers will both have gaping holes in them if the P-G film is ever proved a hoax, since both authors relied on it considerably. I quite agree on the point of locating anomalous bones lying (or alleged to lie) in museum collections and retesting them, but you’re probably not going to find a funding source unless sasquatch is first established to exist in the wild by better evidence than we now have.
A side note: I’m not a field guy, but I noted the comment that camping out and waiting for the local wildlife to accept you and come around has failed. According to Ivan Sanderson, it’s usually the only thing that works. To speculate, it depends a great deal on the animal. Chimps who have had no human contact are reported to come right up to people to investigate them, while gorillas, much more cautious by nature, took months to accept Dianne Fossey and let her close to them. If sasquatch is both cautious by nature AND had learned to stay shy of humans, it’s probably going to take a Fossey/Sanderson approach to get evidence, absent a lucky chance encounter. The reason the approach may not have worked so far is that no one has done it long enough in the right place. That, of course, leads us back to the question of what the right place is, and how you determine that, which leads back to the question of which sightings and footprints one thinks are authentic.

Mattbille- I have done field work for known animals and I say that I agree with you completely. Actually, sustained work in the field is one of the best ways to study animals in my opinion. Unless Bigfoot is some complete freak of nature, then this sort of field work has every possibility of producing results and good observations, and therefore I do not think the fact that it has failed so far means that it is not a viable method. I agree that the problem is that we may just not know enough about their habits and location to make field work very effective, especially if the intent is for them to come to us. Even with known animals, it can take quite a long time to produce good results and these are animals whose behavior and movements have been well documented. I have gone out and been skunked before and I wasn’t even studying particularly rare animals ( the Japanese tanuki if you care to know). Some of the Bigfoot expeditions going out for just a few days at a time, looking for an animal that very little is known about and whose existence has not even been verified yet are almost certain to meet with results that leave much to be desired unless there is that chance encounter. This can further be compounded by bad data or faulty reports.
I think that if these field expeditions are going to produce anything near what Fossey achieved, then there is going to have to be more information available on these creatures. I am talking information on physiology, movements, any migrations, feeding habits, social structure, and so on. I definately think that weeding out the bad data will invariably help in this endeavor. Right now I just feel that the Bigfoot is still for the most part an enigma and not enough is known about them to mount a truly worthwhile field expedition and certainly not enough is known about them to start using the method of having them come to us. This could be a reason why they have failed with this method up to now, but I do not believe for a second that this method of research is unfeasible or unusable with Bigfoot. We need the information and perhaps just as importantly, we need the time to get it done.

That would be one major dig. The area all around the base of the Mt. is still covered in ash. And it’s deep. Me and my brother road our HOGS up there last summer. (And let me say, I was relieved when we headed down. It’s spooky. The thing is still steaming) But if somebody did a major archaeological dig, I bet that would be as good a place as any to look. Maybe even better. The forests all around the Mt. are a great place for the BIG ONES to live. I’m gonna try and spend a week or so in the area this summer. Also Star Mt. and the Gifford Pinchot National Forest areas. I know they out there. Well, I believe they are. Many sightings in them areas.

Greenmartian, if I’m not mistaken, someone DID have that idea in the aftermath of the volcanos eruption, and in fact, did some digging. This was a number of years ago, and I doubt that (at least) the original searchers are still looking. The last I heard, they found some deer carcasses, but little else.